The Driving Question Board (DQB) is yet another powerful tool utilized by both teachers and students in a project-based or inquiry-based classroom. This instructional tool is used to encourage student curiosity and promote the use of practical skills such as questioning and reasoning which is often required in the science environment. What is it? DQB is a large poster board or presentation that poses a "Driving Question" of the unit followed by a subset of questions constructed by both the teacher and the students at the beginning of each new unit. More specifically, a teacher provides the "Driving Question" during the first few minutes of class at the start of the new unit typically during an anchoring activity or mini-investigation. In groups, students are to generate a series of their own questions and record those on post-its. Next a class discussion will follow to expand, condense and eliminate certain questions. This promotes student ownership in the classroom and final questions on the poster board and hang it at the front of the classroom. During each subsequent lesson, the teacher will make connections between the driving question, previous content learned and new knowledge gained. In most cases, students create some sort of artifact at the end of each lesson. These artifacts would be posted next to the questions on the DQB. At the close of the unit, students will have the ability & knowledge to answer each question on the board. It also provides a vehicle for introducing new content topics or informal assessments from an instructional prospective.
Why use a DQB? It allows students to make connections between various lesson activities and the concepts addressed by the Driving question. Next, it helps organize learning concepts by creating a road map for students to follow by highlighting what has been learned during the unit and where they are going with it. In addition, it allows students to get used to the idea of asking questions just like scientists would when starting a research project. Lastly, students are more likely to be engaged in the unit since they helped create the road map of the unit, having ownership in the DQB. Most importantly, it helps create a community of learners.
Reflection
I chose this article because it ties into our previous class discussion on inquiry. As discussed, it is extremely important to get students in the habit of generating questions and making predictions as scientists do in the real world. The lesson learned from this article is that before you jump into a whole unit, lay the groundwork and allow the time for students to be determine what they want to learn from the unit. Make sure you plan an engagement/Intro activity or provide some sort of phenomena that will peak student's curiosity and allow the opportunity for students to decide what they want to take out of this lesson. The DQB adds cohesivness to a unit by creating a bridge between each lesson, the driving question and the student's interest. Finally, I wanted to add that this DQB tool is not just a tool for inquiry based or project based learning but rather a tool to incorporate in traditional instruction as well! During each meeting, we have all agreed that creating purpose in instruction is extremely important particularly at the secondary level; if students are able to make connections between their own interests & curiousity and a unit topic, then perhaps it help us as teachers gage each lesson to fit the student's needs regardless what method of instruction style we choose.
The Driving Question Board
A visual organizer for project-based scienceFortus, B., Shwarz, Y. & Weizman, A. (2008). The Driving Question Board. The Science Teacher., November, 34-37.
http://www.nsta.org/publications/article.aspx?id=Z349URi8cV7i0URZ7M/59TlXLvriy/UrmbM0l6HmOME=
Log in: Rathemacher
Password: 515155
Review
The Driving Question Board (DQB) is yet another powerful tool utilized by both teachers and students in a project-based or inquiry-based classroom. This instructional tool is used to encourage student curiosity and promote the use of practical skills such as questioning and reasoning which is often required in the science environment. What is it? DQB is a large poster board or presentation that poses a "Driving Question" of the unit followed by a subset of questions constructed by both the teacher and the students at the beginning of each new unit. More specifically, a teacher provides the "Driving Question" during the first few minutes of class at the start of the new unit typically during an anchoring activity or mini-investigation. In groups, students are to generate a series of their own questions and record those on post-its. Next a class discussion will follow to expand, condense and eliminate certain questions. This promotes student ownership in the classroom and final questions on the poster board and hang it at the front of the classroom. During each subsequent lesson, the teacher will make connections between the driving question, previous content learned and new knowledge gained. In most cases, students create some sort of artifact at the end of each lesson. These artifacts would be posted next to the questions on the DQB. At the close of the unit, students will have the ability & knowledge to answer each question on the board. It also provides a vehicle for introducing new content topics or informal assessments from an instructional prospective.Why use a DQB? It allows students to make connections between various lesson activities and the concepts addressed by the Driving question. Next, it helps organize learning concepts by creating a road map for students to follow by highlighting what has been learned during the unit and where they are going with it. In addition, it allows students to get used to the idea of asking questions just like scientists would when starting a research project. Lastly, students are more likely to be engaged in the unit since they helped create the road map of the unit, having ownership in the DQB. Most importantly, it helps create a community of learners.
Reflection
I chose this article because it ties into our previous class discussion on inquiry. As discussed, it is extremely important to get students in the habit of generating questions and making predictions as scientists do in the real world. The lesson learned from this article is that before you jump into a whole unit, lay the groundwork and allow the time for students to be determine what they want to learn from the unit. Make sure you plan an engagement/Intro activity or provide some sort of phenomena that will peak student's curiosity and allow the opportunity for students to decide what they want to take out of this lesson. The DQB adds cohesivness to a unit by creating a bridge between each lesson, the driving question and the student's interest. Finally, I wanted to add that this DQB tool is not just a tool for inquiry based or project based learning but rather a tool to incorporate in traditional instruction as well! During each meeting, we have all agreed that creating purpose in instruction is extremely important particularly at the secondary level; if students are able to make connections between their own interests & curiousity and a unit topic, then perhaps it help us as teachers gage each lesson to fit the student's needs regardless what method of instruction style we choose.
--Ashley B.